While Knight remained silent, the judge's formal sentencing announcement on Friday caused family members to break into tears. They walked out of court crying and used a blanket to cover the young daughter that Knight fathered with co-defendant Amber Meidinger, who is awaiting her day in court.

A Westmoreland County jury deliberated for two hours Thursday before sentencing the 22-year-old Knight to death. He pleaded guilty earlier to first-degree murder in the February 2010 killing of Daugherty.

"That kind of makes me feel a little better to know it can happen," said the victim's mother, Denise Murphy. "Maybe this will speak volumes to people that this kind of things does happen. You can't do these types of things and get away with it."

Investigators said Knight and 25-year-old Ricky Smyrnes wrapped the 30-year-old Daugherty's body in plastic, then stuffed it into a garbage can, which was later found in the parking lot of Greensburg Salem Middle School.

Smyrnes, unlike Knight, has contested his guilt. If he's convicted at his trial in October, he could also face the death penalty.

Daugherty's hair was cut off by Knight as she was systematically tortured by Knight, Smyrnes and four others at Smyrnes' apartment in Greensburg, according to the charges. The garbage container with her body was found wedged under a truck parked in a middle school parking lot in a snowstorm, authorities said.

Westmoreland County District Attorney John Peck contends Daugherty was tortured for two days and killed because Smyrnes' then-girlfriend, Angela Marinucci, had convinced the others that Daugherty had sexual desires for Smyrnes and Knight. Marinucci was convicted and sentenced in 2011 to life in prison and didn't face the death penalty because she was just 17 when Daugherty was killed.

"(Daugherty) was looking for friends and looking for attention and had traveled from Mt. Pleasant to Greensburg to be with her friends, and this is what she met. Unfortunately, she met a few days of torture and her death," Peck said.

Amber Meidinger, 22, who was pregnant with Knight's child at the time and has since given birth, testified at Knight's penalty trial that Daugherty was tied up with Christmas lights and tinsel, compelled to write a suicide note, then forced to drink a cocktail of human waste, bleach and prescription drugs. Meidinger is awaiting trial and faces the death penalty, too.

When the mixture didn't kill Daugherty, her tormentors voted that she must die, authorities said. Knight said he stabbed her on Smyrnes' orders before both men choked her and got rid of her body.

For nine days, Peck and his team argued Knight intended to make Daugherty suffer.

Knight's legal team, who did not comment following the verdict, tried to argue he was anti-social, lived with mental disabilities and behavioral issues. Peck asked jurors to leave it out of their verdict.

"I thought these were decisions that would arouse sympathy in the normal person, but these are decisions that have to be made with your head, not with your heart," Peck said.